Scars
by J.HunterFiction
Summary: It's been two years since Kurt Wagner left the X-Men and moved to UK, but now a ghost from the past lures him back to the United States. After reuniting with his former girlfriend he will need to face the fact that she chose to be an assassin, how'll it play with his good hearted nature? Read and find out. Losely based on comicverse; Warning: includes romance and cruelty.


_He felt as if though the strange vast space he was floating in was made of warmth. Soft sound seemed to radient with it, odd as it is, and even the sweet smell felt warm and the green and blue and yellow blur of light before his eyes did as well. It all felt like spring turned into a hazy sensation. He felt safe, sensed the presence of someone trusted and very familiar. He didn't wonder who this is, he just accepted the reality of it as it was. And then, the person's voice spilled their identity;_

 _„Hey, wake up" it was soft, giggly and innocent. The blur cleared revealing his older sister leaning over him with a smile. Her light blonde hair swayed softly with the wind, reflecting the yellow sunlight, her blue eyes were sparkling. Only for a moment it seemed strange for him that she's about twelve, but moment later he knew he's eight and that's the way it's supposed to be. No questions asked, he dived back into the childhood days._

 _„Jamaine…?" he whispered sleepily, only now the fact that he just woke up occuring to him._

 _The twelve year old giggled in response, standing straight and smoothing out her flowy, yellow summer dress. She reached out, offering her slender hand to him. „Everyone is waiting for you" she said, and the sudden solemn and damanding tone made him twitch and look up at her rapidly. She was looking him dead in the eye, her face clear of emotions. She was older, a young woman now; he didn't think much of it, she just grew up, and so did he, now 16 and turning 17._

 _He lifted his hand off the cold grass and took a hold of her offered palm. He felt some heavy guilt building up in his throat, but at this point he couldn't name the source._

 _Fixed on his guilt he let Jamaine lead him somewhere darker and colder, as he followed reluctantly knowing inside his heart that he's headed to face just the reason he feels this way. Or should we say, reasons._

 _A little crowd of figures awaited him in a semi circle. He felt Jamaine let go of his hand as he stepped into the clear area alone. The people that surrounded him were familiar to him, he met them all at different point in his life, but his memory of each and every one of them was stained with a conclusive moment of deep regret, that often being the last memory of them he had, if not to count some cold shoulders and resentful glances. There were all people who had a huge impact on his life – most of whom he loved, held dear and missed still._

 _He stepped back, feeling his lungs being crushed by guilt. But then his back hit something that was cold but moving and he looked up, behind him, at Jamaine. His heart skipped a beat. Her skin was greyish, her dress dirty, her hair messed and void of color._

 _„Why did you let me die?" she asked in a hoarse whisper that echoed in his head like a bell. Suddenly he realized she's covered in her own blood, and that blood made him remember ever so clearly the moment she was murdered in front of his eyes._

 _„Why have you done this to me?" another familiar voice came from across the place, a voice filled with rage. He turned around, expecting to see who he knew the voice belogned to far in the back, he chocked with fear when he saw Staphen's bloody eyes right before his face, the brother's head twisted unnaturaly._

 _Fever apology wanted to come out of his mouth but he found it impossible to open them, his jaw clenched. He wanted to tell him that he never meant to hurt him, kill him, that he just wanted to stop him from murdering any more innocent children. It was Stephen who gone mad, and he? He just wanted to help him, he didn't mean for his neck to twist, he would never even think to go this far with his attempts of stopping him…_

 _„You killed my son, and I thought you weren't a monster" his mother's voice made him turn his face to look at her judgemental, tearful eyes. Her words stung like acid, not only suggesting she blames him for Stephen's death, doesn't perceive him for her son anymore, but also implying she came to consider him a monster for what he's done and accepting that he's a monster by nature after all, just like everybody told them all along. He looked away, unable to hold her gaze as he knew she would never forgive him, just like he would never forgive himself._

 _He wished he could take it all back, erase the past and undo the mistakes, start all over and make it better. Save the people who suffered because of him, save himself from suffering because of those who wanted him hurt._

 _He tried to shield his face with his arms, finding taking the blame a killing strike. Meanwhile they, people he cared about, were growing bigger and more disfigured as their accusations melted into a modulated horrific shierk that resonated in his brain to the point it caused terrible pain. He stumbled, tripping over his own feet fell backwards and hit the ground. They continued to circle him, like a pack of wolfs circled its pray. Their whispers and yells blend into one distorted ‚you failed us' call repeated all over again and again and again. Fear guilt and despair boiled inside of him bringing him to the edge of screaming due to how overwhelming it was, but he was suffocating and choking on the sound of his voice. And they continued to close in on him, inch by inch reducing the little space he had left._

 _The chant continued to resonate in his head and all around him. You failed us, you failed us, you failed us – louder, angrier. You failed us, you failed us – his world was made up of this terryfying noise. You failed us…_

 _All of sudden everything went quiet. Silence that fell was so unpenetrable and voidlike that for a moment he thought he's gone deaf from the overwhelming chant, then there was yet another voice;_

 _„You promised me something" he heard her, and his heart raced. He slowly opened his eyes, but the crowd of people was gone, now only she was there with him, standing a few feet away. She was wearing a white summer dress, something he never saw her in, but somehow it felt appropriate attire right here and now. Her brown hair fell freely on her chest, her brown eyes focused on him seriously, yet with a hint of sadness._

 _„Fallen…" he whispered, speaking for the first time since he called Jamaine's name. Ever since then it felt impossible to speak, now he was free to do it again, like a spell was lifted._

 _But the girl didn't react, acting as if he didn't say anything. And then he realized he in fact didn't, it was just his thought._

 _The girl stepped towards him, lightly approaching on bare feet. It didn't seem odd to him. She crouched in front of him, her arms enveloping her own knees. He felt his heart squeeze, he missed her so much. He lifted his hand, wanting to bad to feel her, but he froze still at what she said next; „You promised to come back for me."_

 _His hand remained in the mid air, inches away from her face. Her gaze was that of expectation, but he didn't know how to respond. His throat clenched again, with sorrow and regret. „I'm sorry" he whispered, but then he realized – it's just a thought again. He can't apologize to her. His lips just trembled chanting it but no sound was made._

 _Until she said something that broke his heart;_

 _„You failed me, too…"_

The man suddenly woke up, his eyes shutting open and staring into the ceiling as he tried to assure himself it was just a dream. His heart hammered in his chest as if though he just escaped death itself. Keeping his eyes on the ceiling he wondered what should he do.

The dream kept reoccuring, many nights already it had him awake shaken and full of regret. He knew it won't just let him go, because those were all things that were like unfinished bussiness to him. All the times people suffered because of him, those situations he couldn't take back and finally - the guilt he had to live with. Those all made him forever undone.

But for four years there was one more element that added up to all of this and it was Fallen – she appeared in his nightmares to tell him that now she's one of the people he loved and failed.

He started living at Prof. Xavier's Institute at the age of 21, with her it started seven years later and ended anoteher four amazing years later when he left to Germany to tend to his sick mother. Before taking off he promised to be back soon, but the situation got worse and worse and he ended up staying much longer than he originally planned. Sometime in between he lost contact with Fallen and upon arriving back to America he discovered that she left, vanished into thin air and without a trace.

He spent two more years living at Xavier's before he moved to United Kingdom to start his European version of the X-Men – The Excalibur.

For a while life was good as it gets, far as it goes with the burden of regrets. Peace was relative but pretty constant, people eased down on the mutant-hate agenda and things started settling for a new era. Much like hate towards the blacks in the 70s, now hate towards mutants started slowly transitioning from default to banished bahvior, and sure same as racism it would probably not cease to exist for centuries, but things were on their way. All that given there was less to fight for or against, so X-Men, The Exaclibur, and all organizations similiar to them stepped down to be something more alike police units mostly controlled by the government than self-proclaimed superheroes. There was just no super-danger to fight anymore, everyone got to focus on their own lives and stay off-duty most of the time.

Being off-duty gave him time and time gave his thoughts room to grow. Now not only were his guilt-ridden dreams more frequent, but also one more thought kept resurfacing.

He turned to his side, now facing the window. Cool morning glow leaked in through the curtains, he could see dust swaying in the beam of light that was but a thin line splitting the room in half. Without lifting off the sheets he opened his bedside drawer and explored the insides until his felt a piece of paper. He pulled it out and unfolded, his eyes sliding over the stranger handwriting for the countless time this month.

It read, „Your girlfriend is in Atlanta." Short and simple, just like that. No recipent, no actual name, no exact location, no signature. It raised endless questions and didn't really provide any answers. Given the randomness and generalization of the message he wouldn't consider himself a wise man if he gave it much thought, but there was one more thing that came with it.

This time he lifted onto his elbow to reach back into the drawer and he pulled out a photograph. The amount of people in the crowd made it difficult to make out any surroundings or a background, but around the third plan he saw her – stroding through the street, hair blown back with the wind, stern look on her face visible even in this semi-poor quality photo. He had no doubt at all that it's her in the photo, but the message provided so little information and thus – credibility – that he felt like it's just a bad joke.

Why would someone decide to make a ‚joke' like that, he didn't know, but neither he did why and how would someone drop this message for real. And even if he assumed this was real, it would seem insane to go to Atlanta to find Fallen. He did feel terrible about the way they never got to talk about what happened, and why it happened, but traveling across the world just for this closure would seem insane. Not I-wouldn't-want-to-do-it insane, but if-I-do-she'll-commit-me-to-an-asylum insane. Still, wasn't it tempting…

These days were rough on him psychically for some reason. He just felt so exhausted with the life he was living and so unsatisfied every evening he closed his eyes to sleep. It got to the point when he found himself browsing through airline's websites, wanting to trust his fate with whatever cheap flight would draw his eye. And there were many, to so many well known or random destinations, but somehow every time he resisted, finding any reason to wait for a different occassion. He needed to do this, he wanted to do that, he didn't like the weather in the place of destination, he didn't want to bother with visas, and on and on the excuses went. Until Thursday, the 17th of October., when one particular offer made its way to top of the front page of the site and TAP Portugal airlines smoothly drew his attention not so much with the price as with the destination – Atlanta City.

He clicked the offer and filled in all the required client information and then stopped, looking at the complete form he bit his lip. Eventually he hit the last confirmation button and exhaled slowly as the screen displayed his newly bought ticket for the following weekend.


End file.
